


Stand By You, Run By You (I'm a million miles smarter but I ain't learnt a thing)

by SilverMyfanwy



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Assassins & Hitmen, Beaches, Bunkers, Cabin Fic, Chickens, Chinese Food, Churches & Cathedrals, Cooking, Forests, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Sex, Kinda, Lighthouses, M/M, Marvel Trumps Hate 2019, On the Run, SHIELD, Spiders, Trains, Walks In The Woods, also kinda - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:28:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22070050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverMyfanwy/pseuds/SilverMyfanwy
Summary: There was a man standing in the doorway of the cabin, holding a bucket in one hand and waving at Clint with the other. “Hey! You okay?”Clint took a few steps closer to the cabin. “Yeah. Yeah, sorry for bringing my dog close. I wasn’t sure what was here.”“No worries. You need food or somewhere to sleep or something?”“A place to sleep would be nice.” Clint carried on walking closer and got a better view of the man. He was tall, broad and had long brown hair, was wearing a black hoodie and blue jeans.“Come in.” the man said. “I’m Bucky. You can bring your dog in.”
Relationships: Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov, James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton
Comments: 35
Kudos: 81
Collections: Marvel Trumps Hate 2019





	1. The Cabin in the Wood

**Author's Note:**

  * For [heuradys](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heuradys/gifts).



> Ta da! My first MTH 2019 offering finally complete.  
> Thank you to heuradys for giving me so much free reign!  
> Part of the title- (I'm a million miles smarter but I ain't learnt a thing)- is from Trouble by Avicii.
> 
> Updates will probably be on a weekly basis.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter:  
> A character decides that another character isn't a serial killer.  
> Mentions of intoxication.  
> Mentions of fire.

Clint stared at the forest with a combination of incredulity and disbelief. It seemed to extend over the hills and far, far away until eternity or some similarly ridiculous distance. He had nurtured the vague hope that they might find a farm with a barn or shed they could sleep in, but the hope shrivelled up and died with what must have been the ninth consecutive mile of trees. He didn’t fancy having to spend another night sleeping up a tree, or under one, or in one. (Don’t ask.)

Lucky seemed to be perfectly happy. She was running in and out of bushes; Clint kept having to run after her to stop her from chasing rabbits or squirrels.

They’d been walking for a very long time.

Walking was different to running- there was more worrying. There was more time to worry about where you’d find your next meal, rather than if you were going to be alive to eat it or not. There was also more time to get bored and Clint had found himself counting the number of different types of leaf he could spot, something he never thought he’d find himself doing.

Dark began to rear its irritating little head and Clint wished he could kick it back into a far corner of the galaxy where it would never bother him again, but he didn’t exactly have a rocket in his rucksack so he settled for whistling Lucky to his side and putting her lead on so she wouldn’t go missing. He hadn’t yet seen a tree he fancied using as a bed for the night. There were a couple of branches he could have slept on, but when he did that he had to tie himself in so he didn’t fall out during the night and that was fiddly.

He might just get the tent out, though it was about ten time fiddlier.

(And orange. Who buys an orange tent? Clint when he’s drunk, apparently.)

He was about to stop and set up camp, start a fire and decide which tin of cold soup he would be drinking that night when Lucky stopped walking and pricked her ears.

Clint looked down at her and frowned. “What’s wrong?”

She started sniffing the air and after a few moments of worrying that someone had been sent to reel him in, he was pretty sure he could smell what Lucky could.

Smoke.

“What say we try for goodwill and hospitality?” Clint suggested. He was pretty sure he could smell food as well. “You can find wood for their campfire.”

Except it wasn’t a campfire and Clint suddenly found himself having reservations on whether he was going to try for goodwill and hospitality or not. Coming across a camper in the woods and striking up a friendly conversation was one thing, knocking on the door of what appeared to be a smallholding- going by the chicken coop and the sheds- was something else entirely.

“Sorry Lucky.” Clint muttered and began to walk away. “Looks like it’s a tree after all.”

The leaves crinkling beneath his feet blocked out the sound of the cabin door being opened.

“Hey!”

Clint spun around, nostrils flaring and automatically ready for a fight.

There was a man standing in the doorway of the cabin, holding a bucket in one hand and waving at Clint with the other. “Hey! You okay?”

Clint took a few steps closer to the cabin. “Yeah. Yeah, sorry for bringing my dog close. I wasn’t sure what was here.”

“No worries. You need food or somewhere to sleep or something?”

“A place to sleep would be nice.” Clint carried on walking closer and got a better view of the man. He was tall, broad and had long brown hair; was wearing a black hoodie and blue jeans.

“Come in.” the man said. “I’m Bucky. You can bring your dog in.”

“Thanks.” Clint stepped up into the cabin, Lucky following him happily.

The cabin had one room. There was a fire at one end with a German Shepard sleeping peacefully in front of it and a bed tucked away in a corner. There was a stove next to the fire and a large table in the middle of the room with a dirty plate on it and a pile of books. The walls were covered in shelves and cupboards, a set of knives on a stand, a wardrobe next to the bed.

“Can I say hello to her?” Bucky asked, gesturing to Lucky.

Clint nodded. “Her name’s Lucky. She’ll be fine with you.”

Bucky crouched down and held a hand out to Lucky so she could sniff it. “Hey.”

Clint was now fairly certain that Bucky wasn’t a serial killer. Serial killers weren’t as nice to dogs as Bucky was. “I’m Clint.”

Bucky smiled and held out a hand. “Nice to meet you. You walking through?”

Clint nodded.

“Where are you headed?” Bucky shifted his weight to one leg and the neckline of his hoodie shifted. Clint was pretty sure he could see the plates of a metal arm through the sleeve.

Clint hesitated in his answer. “Your arm.”

Other things in the cabin began to click into place, but it was the book at the top of the pile on the table that did it. The Complete Herbal Handbook for Farm and Stable by Juliette de Bairachi Levy, which was a perfectly valid book in its own right but also the book used by SHIELD to hide their handbook in. “Which department were you in?”

“Which were you in?” Bucky shot back, suggesting that he was not, as Clint had feared, a set-up to send him back to Coulson.

“I worked for Coulson.”

“And now what?”

Clint pulled a face and shrugged a shoulder. “I- uh. I had enough. But SHIELD don’t want me to have had enough, so they keep trying to make me go back. And you?”

“I was never in a department.” Bucky said. “They tried to get me to join, but I wouldn’t.”

“So you don’t know who Coulson is?”

“Someone to do with Fury?”

Clint nodded. “His deputy’s deputy. Or he was when I left, anyway. How’d you end up with a handbook if you- sugar. You’re the Winter Soldier.”

“I was the Winter Soldier. I’m not anymore.” Bucky looked at the floor and rubbed the back of his neck with a hand that was most definitely metal. “I guess you’re not gonna trust me enough to stay.”

“Anyone who SHIELD tries and fails to recruit is someone I can get on very well with.” Clint smiled at Bucky and watched his face light up. “And I’m really sick of sleeping in trees. I’m staying. If you’ll still have me.”

Bucky smiled. “Of course. You want dinner?”

Clint nodded. “Please. Can I take Lucky off her lead? Will your dog be alright with her?”

Bucky nodded. “Ponchik’s friendly.”

“Ponchik? What kind of a name is that?”

Bucky grinned. “It’s Russian for doughnut. I got her from a doughnut seller in Novosibirsk.”

“I got my dog from a pizza place.” Clint said.

“How did you get a dog from a pizza place?”

“They found her on the street and were keeping her in the back. I went in for pizza and left with her instead.”

“She’s lovely.” Bucky said.

“So’s your dog.”

“Food?”

Clint smiled at Bucky and felt a growing warmth towards him. “Food sounds good.”


	2. The Bunker

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's up sooner than expected! Yay!  
> Warnings:  
> Mentions of being assassins, murder, knives, shooting people, strangling people and spiders, but it's all skimmed over pretty quickly.

Bucky cleared the table and wordlessly handed Clint a knife, a chopping board and a pair of carrots. “You worked for SHIELD. You must be good with a knife.”

Clint pulled a wry face. “I’m not that good.”

Bucky gave him a look of utter incredulity. “You worked at SHIELD and you’re not that good with knives? Don’t tell me you worked at a desk or something.”

“I was an assassin and a spy.” Clint said.

Bucky’s look turned disbelieving. “You were an assassin and a spy but you’re no good with knives?” he folded his arms. “Prove it. I don’t believe you.”

Clint picked up the knife and carefully took the ends off one of the carrots. He looked at Bucky expectantly. “Happy?”

“No. I thought you’d be able to do that really quickly.” Bucky took the knife from Clint and had the carrot chopped into identical pieces in a matter of seconds.

Clint would have been lying if he had said he wasn’t slightly turned on by the whole process.

Bucky repeated his actions with the other carrot and then took the pieces over to a pan on the stove, where he added them and the smell of pork and vegetable came steaming out. “What was your code name?” he asked.

“You wondering if I ever got sent to kill you?” Clint remarked dryly.

Bucky shook his head. “I’d have remembered your face.” he said, voice deep. “I was wondering if I’d ever heard of you.”

“Hawkeye.”

A far-away look came into Bucky’s eyes. “They mentioned you, a few times. You worked with the Black Widow, and you were the guy with the bow and arrow, right?”

“Yeah. And you shot people with a rifle or choked them or stabbed them.”

There was a flicker of pain across Bucky’s face and he hung his head. “I did.”

“I’m sorry.” Clint said quietly. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Why did you stop? I thought you were good.”

Clint raised an eyebrow at him and rested a boot on the edge of his chair as he leaned back and folded his arms. “Good? I was the best SHIELD could get hold of.”

“Why’d you leave?”

“Got pretty sick of killing people and being paranoid. I wanted to be normal.”

“You think you’ll ever get there?” Bucky gave the stew a stir and got two bowls out of a cupboard.

“Maybe I’ll take a leaf out of your book and move to a farm or something.” Clint drawled. “How’d you end up with a cabin in the woods, anyway?”

“Bought it.”

“That’s dull.”

“Shut up and eat your dinner.” Bucky handed Clint a bowl of stew and they fell silent as they ate.

-

“I’ll be on my way in a couple of minutes.” Clint told Bucky the next morning. He was sitting on the sofa he’d spent the night on and doing his laces up. “Get out of your way.”

“Don’t rush on my part.” Bucky said. “Take all the time you need.”

Clint smiled. “Thanks.”

“Where do you think you’ll go now?”

Clint shrugged. “I’ll just carry on walking.”

A concerned look came across Bucky’s face. “No one’s following you, are they? Because if someone is, they’re going to end up here.”

“I don’t know if I’m being followed or not.”

“I’ll walk with you to the edge of the forest. Make sure that no one’s following you. And if they are, I’ll take care of it.”

“Thanks.” Clint said quietly. “Lucky! Come on!”

Lucky looked up from the squeaky toy she had taken off Ponchik and didn’t move.

“Ponchik. Let’s go for a walk now.” Bucky said. Ponchik seemed to be far better behaved than Lucky because she got to her feet immediately and trotted over to Bucky. Bucky took a lead off the hook by the door and attached it to her collar.

“Will you go for a walk now if Ponchik’s going for one too?” Clint asked Lucky.

Lucky duly got up and allowed Clint to put her lead on. He picked up his rucksack and waited for Bucky to throw his own rucksack over his shoulder. They walked out of the cabin, Bucky locked the door in three different places and then they began to make their way through the wood.

“How long have you been living here for?” Clint asked. He unclipped Lucky’s lead so she could go running off with Ponchik.

“About a year.”

“Do you like it?”

Bucky thought for a moment. “It’s calm. It’s quiet. Nothing really happens.”

“I’d like to live somewhere like this.” Clint said. “But I think I’d get bored after a while, if I had nothing to do and I didn’t see anyone.”

“It was alright at first.” Bucky said. “I had a lot of thinking to do. Work out who I was, what I was doing, what I wanted to do. And then after that was done, I think I did get bored. Getting the chickens helped but it’s not like I could hold a conversation with them.”

They walked all day, mostly in silence.

“How long does this forest go on for?” Clint asked Bucky after passing what felt like the seven millionth tree.

“Quite a while longer.”

“Will I reach the end by dusk if I keep on walking?”

“If you walk all night, you’ll be there by midday tomorrow.”

“I guess I’ll be sleeping in another tree tonight then.” Clint said simply. “Hang on, are you going to be able to get back before dark?”

Bucky shook his head.

“You should’ve said and gone back earlier. I would’ve been fine.” Clint said.

“I’ll be fine too.”

“What about your chickens?”

“There’s a woman who comes to buy eggs from me every day. She knows that if I’m not there when she shows up, she has to look after them until I get back in return for free eggs and if I’m gone for over a week, she can have the cabin.” Bucky looked at the floor as he spoke.

Clint groaned. “Don’t tell me this forest is so big that if you walk with me to the edge it’ll be a week before you get back.”

Bucky laughed. “It’s not that big.”

Dark began to fall in earnest.

“I’d better start looking for a tree.” Clint said. “Lucky! Come here! Are you going to head back now?”

“You don’t need to sleep in a tree tonight.” Bucky said. He took a torch out of his pocket and turned it on as Ponchik and Lucky came running back. “Follow me.”

He headed off the path and up a slope. Clint went after him. “Where are we going?”

“There’s an old bunker around here somewhere.” Bucky muttered. “We can go in there.”

“Are you not going back to your cabin?” Clint asked, startled. “I’m not complaining about you not going back, but I just thought you’d want to, you know, go back. You don’t have to stick around with me because you think I’m gonna get murdered and then my death’ll be on your conscience. I’m not gonna get killed and even if I did, SHIELD wouldn’t want anyone to ever know it.”

“I have to stay here for the night. I could walk back, but I don’t want Ponchik to get tired out. And it’s getting cold. Cone on.”

Further up the slope, they found the bunker. Two triangles of concrete stuck out of a mound of earth, framing the grill that opened into the bunker. They made their way in and Bucky lit a lantern. There was a pile of blankets next to tins of food and two more lanterns.

“Can make a bed with the blankets. I’ve got a sleeping bag.” Bucky said.

“Me too.” Clint muttered. “Seriously, I have no idea why you don’t just go back to your cabin, have you seen the spiders in this place?”

“I don’t think I can go back.” Bucky said quietly, taking his sleeping bag out and laying it down.

Clint frowned. “Why not?”

“I can’t go back knowing you’re still out here.” Bucky said simply. He sat on his sleeping bag and Ponchik lay down beside him. “And it’s not out of a sense of duty or nothin’.”

Clint stood with his own sleeping bag half unrolled for a moment before dropping it, walking over to Bucky, cupping his face in his hands and kissing him.

Clint leaned his forehead against Bucky’s. “You’re coming with me, right?”

He could feel Bucky smiling. “Yes.”

He kissed Bucky again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come say hi on tumblr! silvermyfanwy


	3. Somewhere

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're on mobile, translations of the Russian are in the end notes. If you're on a computer/laptop, simply hover over it with your mouse to read.  
> Hyperlinks are a pain; if they behaved you'd have had the chapter sooner.  
> Chapter warnings: someone gets scared about being around lots of people. There's a bit with a church and mentions of Bibles, if that's an issue for you.  
> Come say hi on Tumblr! I'm silvermyfanwy.

They reached the edge of the wood.

“Where do you want to go?” Bucky asked.

Clint was resisting the temptation to kiss the grass. There wasn’t a single tree in sight. “Uh, I dunno. Keep walking?”

“Can you walk forever?”

“Innocent until proven guilty.”

Bucky furrowed his eyebrows. “What?”

“I’ve never tried to walk forever, so until I’ve tried and failed, I can.”

“I don’t get it.”

Clint scratched the back of his neck. “No, I don’t either. I don’t really fancy walking forever. I quite liked the sitting down in your cabin.”

“If you’re up for a train,” Bucky nodded his head toward a field in the distance as a train began to rumble across it, “there’s a station over there.”

“How do you know that?”

Bucky patted Clint on the shoulder. “I’ve had way too much time on my hands over the last year. I memorised the map of the county.”

Clint gaped at him. “The _county_? But the county’s _huge_!”

“Like I said.” Bucky smiled. “Way too much time on my hands.”

-

The man at the ticket office was half asleep as Clint slid a wad of cash over the counter and was slowly handed a pair of one-way tickets in return. He gave the dogs a wary look and scowled when Lucky wagged her tail at him.

“You been walkin’?” he asked, tone somewhat resentful.

Bucky nodded.

“Conductor’ll have a fit if you get mud on the train.” the man said. “It’ll be here in half an hour.”

Clint smiled. “Thanks for the tip.”

“And I’ll have a fit if you get mud on my platform!” the man called after them as they walked out.

They stared at the trail of footprints behind them.

-

The station where they left the train was a world away from the one they had got on at.

Buildings rose up on either side of it, the sea stretching along the coast in the corner of Clint’s eye as they stepped onto a platform full of people who gave them strange looks and a wide berth. Muddy clothes, large rucksacks, even larger dogs and a metal arm have a tendency to do that.

Bucky’s eyes flitted nervously around the crowd of people. He reached out for Clint’s hand and took it. "Мне страшно."

"Я знаю место неподалеку, где больше никого не будет. Вы можете управлять до тех пор?"

If Bucky was surprised that Clint had understood his Russian, he didn’t show it. He nodded and held Clint’s hand tighter.

It was only a short walk from the platform to the street, which was still busy but less crowded. The sun was beating down on the pavement with a strength Clint had hoped had gone to sleep for the autumn and the sea sparkled on the horizon. Bucky stopped and stared at it for a moment. "Ты когда-нибудь видел море раньше, Починк?"

Ponchik was busy with a wad of chewing gum on the pavement.

They made their way to the seafront and Clint led Bucky down a set of steps to the beach.

“You’d better not be taking me to a beach hut.” Bucky grumbled, kicking the pebbles and scaring a seagull.

“I’m not.” Clint said cheerfully. “Here we are.”

There was a door in the rockface of the cliff towering over them, a door which had ‘DO NOT ENTER’ written on it in large letters.

“We’re going in there?” Bucky asked blankly.

“Yep.”

“How?”

“I got a key in here somewhere.” Clint said, shrugging his rucksack off and holding it between his knees. “I just can’t remember which pocket it’s in...”

“How do you have a key to that place?” Bucky asked as Clint started digging through the rucksack, removing an umbrella, a packet of biscuits and a coil of rope as he did so.

“Nicked it.” Clint pulled out a key wrapped in blood-stained tissues and tried it in the lock. “I think it’s this one.”

The door clicked open and Lucky started eagerly scrambling up the dark stairs, dragging Clint along behind her.

“I’ll bring your bag.” Bucky called after him and swung it onto this arm. Ponchik was more cautious about going in and sniffed warily at the steps. “Should I close the door behind me?”

“Yeah.”

Bucky stepped inside and shut the door, turning his eyes away from the disapproving look an old woman was giving him as he did so. Ponchik walked ahead of him.

“There’s another door up here!” Clint called. “I’m leaving it open for you.”

Clint vanished through the door and light began to stream through it. Ponchik reached the top of the stairs and stopped, waiting for Bucky, who also stopped when he saw what the door opened up to.

There was a long, tiled corridor with dead leaves on the floor leading up to a ladder. The walls were tiled at the base and then grew into yellow arched doorways, light shining through. Caged pipes ran along either side of the ceiling and it was yellow like lemon cake and banana peel and sweets in jars and in the middle, shockingly purple, was Clint. He was beaming from ear to ear. “What do you think? Is this better?”

Bucky nodded. “This is a lot better.”

-

They sat on the floor and ate tinned peaches, waiting for the afternoon to darken and the streets to quiet.

“How’d you know about this place?” Bucky asked.

“Did an undercover stint in a town planning department. Found the files for this place and thought I’d check it out one day.”

“What was it?”

“Tourist attraction no one wanted to buy.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Neither do I.”

They were silent for a moment.

“The dogs are asleep.”

Bucky responded by leaning over and kissing Clint with all the energy he had.

-

The streets were nearly empty by the time they ventured out of the cliff. Takeaways were lit up by neon signs in the windows and the wind was blowing in from the sea.

“What d’you want to do now?” Clint asked. “We can get some food.”

“Food sounds good. Where are we sleeping tonight?”

“I don’t fancy sleeping in a cliff.”

Bucky held out his hand for Lucky’s lead. “You get food, I’ll find somewhere?”

Clint nodded. Lucky was more than happy to trot away with Bucky and Ponchik and Clint headed in the other direction, hands in pockets and shoulders hunched against the wind.

The Chinese takeaway he walked into was empty. Strobe lights shone brightly from the ceiling, reflecting off shining yellow and white tiles. There were two worn chairs by the window and menus in English and Chinese screwed into the walls next to the counter.

The first thing Clint noticed about the woman behind the counter was her hair; short and dyed platinum blonde. The second thing he noticed about her was her face.

“Oh, come on.”

“That’s no way to greet a friend.” Natasha scolded playfully, resting her arms on the counter and smiling. “Haven’t you got anything nicer to say?”

“Not really.” Clint said. “I’m guessing you’re not here to earn pocket money.”

“I have a job for you.” Nat said simply.

“I’ve told _you_ , and _SHIELD,_ and _Coulson_ , that I’m _done_.” Clint said emphatically. “Multiple times. What part of that don’t you get? I’m out, I’m done, I’m _finished_.”

“It’s not that kind of job.” Nat said, nodding at a teenager who walked in and let himself past the counter to the back of the shop. “It’s an actual job. Lighthouse keeper.”

Clint took a step back. “Lighthouse keeper? Seriously?”

Natasha nodded. “Pays. Accommodation. Out of the way. Seriously; it’s on a heap of rock in the middle of the sea. You will not be intercepting goods or dealing with smugglers or anything, before you ask.” she handed him a piece of paper. “Information’s on there. And you can take your dog.” Nat frowned. “Where is she?”

“A friend’s looking after her.” Clint said brusquely.

Natasha raised her eyebrows, eyes twinkling. “A friend?”

“Shut up.” Clint muttered. “Can I order my food now?”

“Kari!” Nat yelled over her shoulder to the kitchen. “You can order from him.” she smiled sadly. “Good luck, Clint.”

“Natasha Romanov, if this is goodbye…”

“Only for now. I’ll come and visit you in your lighthouse.”

“Is that a promise?”

Natasha leaned over the counter and kissed Clint on the cheek. “Promise.”

“Even though I won’t go to the lighthouse?”

Natasha rolled her eyes. “KARI!”

-

Clint found Bucky, Lucky and Ponchik sheltering in the doorway of an abandoned church two streets over. Lucky and Ponchik sniffed at the bags of takeaway eagerly.

"Хорошо?"

Clint nodded. “Ran into an old friend. You found somewhere to sleep?”

“In here.” Bucky pushed the door open and led Clint up a dark, narrow set of stairs to the balcony. A streetlight outside the church was shining through cracked windows to show dirt and leaves all over the floor, peeling paint, crumbling walls and a building slowly falling to pieces.

The dogs were penned into one of the pews and Clint and Bucky sat on the floor, balancing their containers of food on top of Bibles that had been shut for so long the pages had stuck together.

“You’re quiet.” Bucky said. “Who was that friend you ran into?”

“Someone I worked with. She told me about a job she found that was going.”

“What job is it?”

“Lighthouse keeper.”

“I didn’t know that was a job.”

They ate their fill then gave the dogs the leftovers and put the sleeping bags down on the pews.

“Don’t feel right not going to sleep next to you.” Bucky said gruffly. “I know I’ve only known you for three days but it still doesn’t feel right.”

“We could put the sleeping bags down there.” Clint gestured to the floor by the pulpit.

Bucky thought for a moment and nodded.

They moved the dogs and their rucksacks down the stairs and lay the sleeping bags next to each other.

“Can you imagine what the priest of this place would have said if he could see us?” Clint said, sitting down and tugging Bucky down so he could kiss him.

Bucky smiled and gently pushed Clint onto his back. “Something unholy.” he placed his hands on either side of Clint’s head and leaned down to kiss him. “Bet I can make you say something unholy.”

“Bet you can.” Clint whispered as Bucky pressed kisses along his jaw. “I bet you can.”

Bucky made his way to Clint’s throat and sucked a row of hickies as far down as Clint’s hoodie would allow. He pulled back and rested on his knees, placing his hands on the hem of the hoodie. “Can I?”

Clint surged forwards to kiss Bucky sloppily and start tugging clothes off. “You can.” he felt Bucky smile against his lips and then duck his head to kiss Clint’s collarbone.

The night drew on. Neither of them noticed. They were too busy exploring each other’s skin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations: (bear in mind that I used google translate so I have no idea if they're right or not)  
> "Мне страшно." "I'm scared."  
> "Я знаю место неподалеку, где больше никого не будет. Вы можете управлять до тех пор?" "I know a place near here where there'll be less people. Can you manage until then?"  
> "Ты когда-нибудь видел море раньше, Починк?" "You ever seen the sea, Ponchik?"  
> "Хорошо?" "Alright?"


	4. The Lighthouse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter!

Waking up in Bucky’s arms was glorious.

The golden sunlight streaming in from above them, making Bucky look like a fairy tale princess with his dark hair fanned out around his head. “Morning gorgeous.” Clint whispered.

Bucky stirred and his eyelids fluttered as he awoke. “Hiya.”

Clint nipped at Bucky’s neck and then licked over the mark he made, eyeing up all the ones he’d left there the night before. “How long do you there we could stay here for?”

“If we rig the doorway with traps?” Bucky smirked and stretched his arms out above his head. Clint watched the bulging muscles and suppressed the urge to drool. “A pretty long time.”

Ponchik barked and jumped onto the back of one of the pews, grinning at them.

“I think the dogs might give us away.” Clint said.

“I’d really like to stay here with you and pretend the world doesn’t exist but they probably need a walk.”

Clint smiled lazily. “I think they can wait for a bit.”

Bucky beamed back and gently bit Clint’s lower lip. “I think they can too.”

-

“I don’t know where to go from here.” Clint admitted as they walked along the seafront before crowds started flocking in.

Bucky stared out at the sea and smiled. “Does it matter?” he let Ponchik off her lead and followed a few steps behind her as she cautiously walked across the pebbles to the waves foaming along the edge of the beach. “What does a lighthouse keeper do?” he called over his shoulder.

“Looks after a lighthouse, I think.” Clint said.

“Are you gonna let Lucky off her lead?”

“She’ll go charging in the sea and get soaked.”

He took her lead off anyway and she looked at him like she couldn’t quite believe her luck, then sprinted into the sea.

Bucky laughed with joy as she went running past him and then started swimming, tail wagging. Ponchik followed her into the water.

Clint walked down to stand next to Bucky. “You been in the sea before?”

“Not as a kid. Couldn’t swim. Bet I’ve been in since.”

“I’d go in but I don’t wanna get my boots wet.” Clint said.

Bucky laughed again and Clint felt as if the golden sunlight from the church had flooded through his heart and given it a sprinkling of fairy dust. Bucky swung an arm around Clint’s waist and tugged him closer. “Wait until your dog comes out of the sea and wants to give you a kiss. Boots won’t be dry then.”

Clint groaned and buried his face in the crook of Bucky’s neck. “You’ll have to save me from the sea monster.”

Bucky kissed him on the forehead. “Sea monster alright. She’s found some seaweed.” he kissed Clint’s hair and rested his face there for a moment. “I’d save you from anything.” he whispered.

Clint fumbled in his pocket for the scrap of paper Nat had given him. He stared at the number.

“Is that for the job?”

“Yeah.”

Clint folded the paper back up and put it in his pocket again. “I might ring it.”

-

They got on a bus, after a passing old lady decided they needed the towel in the back of her car for their wet dogs.

The dogs sat at their feet at the back of the bus and Clint had his head leaning on Bucky’s shoulder while staring out of the window.

“You gonna ring that number?” Bucky asked softly, running his thumb over Clint’s knee.

“No phone.”

“Got a burner phone.” Bucky said.

“Why’ve you got a burner phone?” Clint asked, intrigued.

“I was told they were useful in the twenty-first century.” Bucky leaned down and opened a zip on the side of his bag. He handed Clint the phone. “Go wild.”

“You don’t know what to do with it, do you?” Clint asked, grinning.

“Nope.”

Clint smiled and turned the phone on.

“You can teach me how to use phones properly.” Bucky said. “I want Instagram.”

Clint laughed. “Okay.” he lingered his fingers over the keys. “What if it’s a fake number or something?”

“Then you hand the phone to me and I growl in Russian.”

Clint rang the number. “Hello?”

“Hello? Who is this?”

“Hi, my name’s Clint Barton. I was told to ring this number about the lighthouse keeper job.”

“Can you swim?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know what the job involves?”

“Not really.”

“You keep the lighthouse clean and working and you make sure the light goes on when it’s supposed to. Then you also have to keep a lookout for ships in distress when there are storms. Communicate with the coastguard a bit. Could you do that?”

“Yeah. What’s the pay like?”

“Three thousand a month. Ferry can come and get you so you can go to the port and get food and stuff. There’s a doctor in the port. You get a month’s shore leave a year; there’s a bathroom, a kitchen, a living room and two bedrooms.”

“So, uh, my partner could come with me?” Clint cleared his throat and looked fixedly out of the window. “And our dogs?”

“How many dogs have you got?”

“Two.”

“That sounds like it would be fine.” the man said. “How did you find out about this job?”

“A friend told me about it.”

“What’s your friend’s name?”

Clint thought carefully for a moment, running through the list of fake names Nat used and worked out which one she was most likely to have given this man. “Beryl.”

“Ah.” Clint could hear the man’s smile. “Well, if she’s friends with you, when would you like to start?”

Bucky beamed at Clint when the call ended. “Are we moving to a lighthouse?”

-

They moved to an ancient stone lighthouse built on a tiny heap of rock in the middle of the ocean. They spent their days listening to weather forecasts, playing with the dogs and making use of the king-sized bed they managed to fit in their room.

Life was salty and windy and soggy, but Clint had Bucky by his side and dogs underfoot.

Life was good.

THE END.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come say hi on Tumblr! silvermyfanwy

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on tumblr! @silvermyfanwy


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